Launched by IFAD in 1985, the SPA was carried out in two phases: SPA I, from 1986 to 1991, and SPA II, from 1992 to 1995. The first phase aimed at reviving small-scale farming systems by building or rehabilitating small-scale irrigation works, improving soil conservation, focusing research on traditional food crops and developing marketing arrangements. The second phase went a step further by including non-farm, income-generating activities and rural microenterprises. Some of the lessons learned from the programme are summarized below:

• In highly dynamic and diversified areas of operation, in which economic opportunities and population priorities evolve rapidly and unpredictably, it is often the flexibility and adapt-ability of development support instruments that determine whether or not development objectives and targets can be achieved effectively. In the design of IFAD’s activities in sub-Saharan African countries, emphasis should be placed on developing decentralized services and funds to support grass-roots organization and investment initiatives, rather than on defining, a priori, what investments are to be made and which organizations need to be established throughout the whole loan disbursement period.
• The choice of operators and the quality of the development partnerships established are central to the success or failure of any venture. Partners should be identified earlier in the design process, institutional diagnosis must be improved and key stakeholders involved in formulating the programmes and services to be fostered. If project/programme design is to evolve during the course of implementation, it is essential that agencies be not only “executing” entities, but that they also be endowed with design and advisory capacity.

• Small, grant-financed pilot projects should be used more frequently so as to establish partnerships upstream of larger-scale programmes (“project nurseries”). However, account must be taken of the fact that any change in the scale of operations necessarily implies a development in the nature of the institutions and partnerships involved, and must therefore be viewed as a phasing-in process.

• Longer-term commitment is needed for achieving sustainable results and successful phasing-out. It is often between the third and the fifth year of project implementation that the most substantial activities have emerged, together with the priority demands of the target groups and solutions to initial design or implementation problems. In order to build on these achievements, more time is needed than the three or four years that remain. Sustainable success is generally the result of perseverance, gradual adaptation and a patient and ongoing learning process. Arranging for second phases, which is the current solution adopted to meet the need for long-term intervention, is not very satisfactory. The long-term perspective is rarely incorporated into the initial implementation strategy (two short-term projects do not make one long-term support programme). It is costly in terms of both time and resources, and often results in a break in funding between phases. Long-term commitment (10 to 12 years) is particularly important for institutional development programmes .

• Programmes must be more firmly anchored to the local economy. To this end, direct relations must be facilitated among farmers’ organizations and local NGOs, enterprises and services, giving the former control over implementing most of the investments financed by the loan. Small farmers’ organizations and the communities should have greater freedom to choose their service-providers, suppliers and construction enterprises. This approach would offer at least four advantages in that it would: (i) through learning, build the capacity of target groups to negotiate (empowerment); (ii) increase the beneficiary ownership of the investments; (iii) reduce costly administrative procedures and foster the sustainability of the development processes; and (iv) strengthen the economic basis and potential of the region.

• IFAD must be given the means to play a greater part in the implementation of the programmes it finances. The new forms of operation that have been recommended, particularly flexible long-term support programmes, will require that major changes be introduced into project design during implementation. In order to ensure that IFAD’s fundamental objectives remain benchmarks throughout this process, it is indispensable that the Fund have a greater role in implementation and in supporting the adjustment of activities through review and evaluation missions. This is a condition for speeding up the process under which IFAD learns, progresses and innovates by drawing on its own experience.

• Annual consultations must be organized on a more systematic basis during programme implementation and attended by representatives of the communities or groups involved with a view to exchanging experience and discussing and evaluating programme activities. These workshops provide an opportunity to strengthen social control over project implementation, bringing out common problems (and solutions) frequently concealed by the vertical and scattered relations that projects may have with the villages. They also help to enhance decision-making transparency.

• Agricultural development in the semi-arid regions, particularly through irrigation and water control, require land and infrastructure development measures, which themselves need external support in the form of investment subsidies. The subsidy rates, procedures and instruments (local development or investment funds) must be harmonized both with national policies and with the approaches of other donors involved. This will limit the distortions too frequently caused by lack of local coordination between the parties involved. IFAD can play a more active role in supporting land development subsidies policy, based on two fundamental principles: (a) the funds must be jointly managed by representatives of the target populations; and (b) the beneficiaries must provide matching contributions in advance. The matching contribution is a signal that makes it possible to identify, validate and prioritize the demand for aid. It is also a condition for the ownership of the investments and for negotiating on an equal footing.

• The capacity for identifying new institutional, technological or organizational innovations must be strengthened, and IFAD should be more involved in their dissemination. These innovations can be generated through upstream participatory research and development activities (ECP and TA grants) and during programme implementation. Here, IFAD should establish sustainable partnerships with operators, institutes and knowledge centres, perhaps even involving them in designing and supervising projects and programmes.

• In the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, most of the traditional areas of IFAD operations receive considerable external aid from donors with more political clout. If IFAD is to strengthen its capacity to contribute to national policies to combat rural poverty and desertification, and replicate its own activities, it must broaden and strengthen dialogue and strategic alliances with all civil-society parties in countries where it operates, and with international donors that share its fundamental objectives.

Hot links IFAD milestones